Huawei U7510 review

Summary

Our Score

7/10

User Score

Review Price free/subscription

The Huawei U7510 is a budget touchscreen phone with 3G support that’s available for a shade under fifty notes on the Three network in the UK. In the US, the phone can be picked up on the T-mobile network where it’s known as the T-mobile Tap.

Most people have probably never heard of Hauwei, but it’s actually one of the biggest manufacturers of telecoms equipment in the world and makes many of the USB modems that operators bundle with their mobile broadband packages.

Most operators rebadge Huawei’s handsets with their own brand name, but Three hasn’t done this in the UK, although the handset is devoid of any Huawei logos (despite the press photo above). The U7510 is available in either black or purple. We had the black version and in terms of looks it’s a dead ringer for Samsung’s Genio Touch, which perhaps isn’t surprising as both devices are aimed at the youth market. The handset is relatively attractive to look at and the chrome band that surrounds the screen and d-pad controller add a touch of elegance. Build quality is good, too, as the chassis feels quite solid and not as plasticky as some other budget phones. The U7510’s small size and curvaceous styling also means it feels comfortable in the hand and we like the rubberised battery cover that gives the phone a grippy feel.

As the U7510 is mostly driven via its touchscreen, there are just three buttons on the front - a central D-pad flanked by two call control buttons. There are a few extra controls positioned on the sides of the phone including a volume rocker and camera key on the right and a power button on the top, which doubles as the lock switch.

The phone’s key feature is obviously its 2.8in touchscreen. This has a resolution of 320 x 240 pixels, which won’t exactly knock your socks off in terms of clarity, but the user interface makes good use of the space available and even the browser isn’t compromised too much by the limited resolution. The screen is reasonably bright and colours look relatively rich and vibrant. It’s fairly responsive to touch input, too, despite the fact that it uses resistive technology.

The U7510 runs Qualcomm’s Brew operating system (version 3.1) which is the same OS as that used on HTC’s Smart. However, whereas HTC has skinned the OS on the Smart to look similar to its Sense interface, the home screen on Huawei’s version looks much more like the Touchwiz interface found on Samsung handsets like the Genio Touch.

In fact, it looks so similar we had to do a double take to make sure it wasn’t actually running Samsung’s software. The similarities really are startling. For instance, like Touchwiz, the U7510’s home screen has a pull-out tab at the side that opens to reveal a column of widgets that you can drag and drop onto the screen and arrange as you like. Imitation may be the sincerest form of flattery but at least Huawei offers a decent range of widgets including ones for Skype and Windows Live Messenger along with a music player, YouTube app and photo gallery. However, whereas Touchwiz offers three different home screens, the U7510 only has one so it can get crowded quickly.